St. Landry democrat., 1887-06-11

saw, accompanied by a note from Jen
nings which informed me it was IAN out
and-outer and no mistake, and Just a
lovely as wax"
don't think I ever felt prouder O
anything in my life than | did of tina
%incarnate demon. His head was so big
his legs so bowed, and his TANKS were s.
small that his appearance presented
continual inclination to go 'bows under
He was SCARED and scanned; one ey,
looked upward and the other turne(
down. He never wagged the shrivelet
n bony appendage that answered for
tail. There was an air Of sullen vindic
t1veness about him that his attendant:
SAID meant straight business" but
which reminded me of an irredeemablt
convict. By starving him for three days
and then handing him his food on {
shovel he got to tolerate me without re.
spect. When / got him so | could leaC
him by a chain the superiority of the hu.
man intellect to the brute instinct made
me vain. l longed for the day when ]
could take my goddess and her nymphs
through b"ull-haunted pastures and show
the grinning, bull -breeding rustics that
there are some things not dreamed of in
their philosophy. BY inordinate rhap,
sodles on theH lamb-like character OF
the bulldog, l got the women to
accept him wonderingly, at a safe
distance, and one wooing afternoon we
started out for our accustomed stroll.
l wish you could have seen that group
on a verdant country road-Diana and
her nymphs in crisp muslin and dainty
Vatican chips, as cool as tinted water
ices, as spick span as peach blossoms,
and yours truly" bringing up the rear
with a grim triumph and a bow legged
malformation that by some inherent
c~ussedness of human nature we had
agreed to call "Adonis." | assured the
timid immortals that there wouldn't be
any more bull trouble. when his
majesty gets sight of this wandering
nightmare" l said, "his sense of the
beautiful will allay his angry passions"
These dogs charm a bull as a snake
charms a bird. It's a mystic principle
of nature not yet sufficiently understood,
but a kin to the mind cure. Have no
more fear; all annoyances from Mr.. Bull
are overt"
Thus encouraged in an official way
they gave no more heed to imaginary
dangers, and with the conscious SUI
periority of a man who talks to a canni-
bal with a seven-shooter in his pocket
at the same time, we proposed to have
an afternoons dalliance with the restful
charms of nature.
Suddenly that bull rose up behind a
clump of sumac, tossed his horns in the
air and let out his thunder. My remarks,
as near as | can remember them, were:
Hal! ha! ladies; mere bravado this
time. He'll not annoy us. Go right
along"
But "Adonis," upon hearing the sounds,
began a rapid series of revolutions. He
n cut ear vertically, and laid
the other back on his head he emitted a
howl of triumph. He leaped into the
stood on his head, turned back SOM
ersaults and described an orbit of frothing
intensity at the length of his chain that
wound us all up in a snarl. He screamed
like a demon, he chewed stones, his up
ward eye was green and his downward
eye was red. "Good heavens ~ remarked
the mature angel. Saints defend us r'
added the nymphs,as they climbed a rock.
peace, my children" l observed as
my hat was jerked off. "He's charming
the bull"
4ucu we Ill CllLlDcu Il TOck.
"Adonis," with a yell like an eighteen
inch shell, had shot out of my keeping,
straight for that bull, his chain smoking
after him like a t%en-second fuse.
Two small details of that flight of
Adonis" are engrayen on my memory.
One is that howl. 1t was the concen-
trated intensity of a nature bred for a
hundred years by %bull-baiting Saxons,
and just woke up to it's mission. The
other was the impact with a stone fence.
The fence was covered with sweet brier,
and we saw something emerge on the
other side that looked like ten yards
square of convulsed conservatory.
We saw the sweet brier moving across
the field in throes and dust. A row of
chips on the edge of a stone
with their hands clasped walked on
with pale faces. Bloodthirsty screams,
with the low sub-base of the
bull, were waited on the breeze, together
with puffs of crushed eglantine. We saw
something revolving in the air. 1t looked
ike a whelp of Tophet, earth vomited.
It was Adonis executing thirty-two rev.
to the second, and accompany
ng himself with h~ellwrought piccolo
and scrannel pipe, but festooned in his
light with wreaths of wild roses.
We saw an indistinguishable chaos of
log and bull and flying vines-a vortex
If dust and delirium. Then the diapason
changed. The key was let down. The
,iccolo and s%crannel pipe ceased, and
he wild cries of bull, pain and rage filled
he hill. That dog had the bull by the
lose and was at rest. 1t was in vain that
he Infatuated animal dashed the earth
With him, and beloved and plunged.
had Adonis been bred and nur-
ured. For this had Jennings selected
linn for this had l paid.
Men came over the hills. In half an
lour the field was black with them. They
'eat the animals with rails from the
ence. They shouted and fell over each
'ther, and great gusts of riotous rural
,lasphemy swept down upon us. THE
Roman arena never equaled this" re-
marked from my private box, keep your
humbs down" said %complacently as
heard the bulls ribs crack under the
nisdirected blows of the fence rails:
Emperors have dreamed in vain of such
sight as this"
After blowing up the whole field,
hooking down several farm hands and
tterly failing to disturb either the grip
7 the equanimity of Adonis, that bull
lade one final blind, maddened rush
outward and plunged over Pierre
'orillard's quarry, burying his Durham